“Rhythm-action” is a popular video game genre which requires a player to perform phrases from a pre-recorded musical composition using the video game's input device. One of the best-known examples of this genre is the BEATMANIA series of games published by Konami Co. Ltd. of Japan. In this series of games the notes in musical phrases are graphically displayed to the player as a series of visual markers spaced along one or more timelines; each marker corresponds to one note in the phrase. In the block diagram environment shown in FIG. 1, visual markers 104 move from the top of the display to the bottom of the display. As each marker on the scrolling timelines 110, 120, 130, 140 passes a graphical cursor 108 displayed along this timeline, the player must simultaneously press a button on an input device (not shown) corresponding to the correct timeline to play the sound of the corresponding note at the correct time. If the player performs this action successfully for a sufficient percentage of the notes, he scores well and wins the game. If the player fails to perform this action successfully for a sufficient percentage of the notes, he scores poorly and loses the game. As shown in FIG. 1, two or more players may compete against each other, typically by each one attempting to play back different, parallel musical phrases from the same song simultaneously. The player who plays the highest percentage of notes correctly achieves the highest score and wins.
It is known, in the context of some rhythm-action games, to provide game controllers simulating musical instruments that allow players to fully use both their right and left hand to provide game input. It would be desirable to provide a game controller that closely mimics the instrument which the controller simulates in such a way that the physical instrument features mimicked by the controller affect gameplay.